The United States has promised the United Nations that it will permanently resettle Iraqi scientists who provide information on Iraq’s secret arms programs, U.S. officials said. Some family members also could be granted asylum.
The Bush administration also has provided weapons inspectors with a list of 80 to 100 names of key scientists involved in developing Iraq’s nuclear, chemical and biological weapons and ballistic missiles. Each is considered a potential source for information on Iraq ‘s past and present clandestine programs, U.S. officials say.
Washington is pressing chief weapons inspector Hans Blix to begin “inviting” about two dozen Iraqi scientists to travel to Cyprus as early as next week for interviews, the sources added. The Mediterranean island is the backup staging post for the inspection teams.
U.S. and UN officials agree that the scientists are more likely to reveal secrets if they and their families are in a secure location outside Iraq. So far, Iraqi scientists have refused to be interviewed except in the presence of an Iraqi government official, apparently to avoid reprisals against themselves and their families.
The inspections are expected to intensify over the next few weeks. More sites are to be visited and more scientists interviewed, administration officials said. On Jan. 27, Blix is scheduled to give the UN Security Council a more definitive declaration of the results of the new inspections. Administration officials insist that date is not a deadline for a war decision.
Although the U.S. has argued since September that defecting Iraqi scientists are likely to provide more useful information than on-site inspections, the Bush administration has resisted offering to resettle large numbers of potential defectors and their families. As in the past, Washington had been encouraging European allies to take the lead.
Last fall, a bipartisan group of senators introduced a bill to expand the number of Iraqi scientists the administration could bring to the U.S.
The proposed law would have permitted as many as 500 Iraqi scientists and their families to be granted political asylum. The bill died for procedural reasons.